Meryl Streep, Anne Hathaway and Stanley Tucci co-star in “The Devil Wears Prada 2.”
The Devil wears … second-hand.
Twenty years after its initial success, “The Devil Wears Prada” is back on the runway — although this time it’s dressed in borrowed clothes. Admitted, they’re chic and flattering, crisp and clearly tailored to fit its stars. But they don’t feel vintage so much as … well, old.
When we left young journalist Andy Sachs in 2006, she had survived — barely — her baptism-by-fire as the assistant-assistant to fashion-mag dragon lady Miranda Priestly. She had learned a lot, too — most important, that this was not the life for her.
Meryl Streep and Anne Hathaway in “The Devil Wears Prada 2.”
As a result, at the final fade-out, she was about to start a more socially conscious career at a scrappy New York newspaper. She was older, wiser, shorn of her puppy-dog-cute-but-not- terribly-supportive boyfriend, and in possession of a much better wardrobe.
You go, girl!
Well, 20 years later, serious journalism is in serious financial trouble — and as a result, Andy is out of a job. Meanwhile, Miranda has troubles of her own: A recent, badly reported feature in her magazine made it look like she was endorsing sweatshops. (Not that she necessarily wouldn’t, you suspect, but apparently it upset her high-end advertisers.)
Miranda needs to give herself and her magazine a serious new image. The still oh-so-serious Andy needs a paycheck. Can two Type-A perfectionists work together without driving each other crazy? That’s the obvious odd-couple energy powering “The Devil Wears Prada 2,” which opens on May 1.
Leaving nothing to chance, the movie reunited almost the entire creative crew behind the first film, building on the upscale style and Jersey-girl sass of stars Meryl Streep (Bernardsville) and Anne Hathaway (Millburn) as well as screenwriter Aline Brosh McKenna (Saddle River).
Emily Blunt in “The Devil Wears Prada 2.”
Add in returning director David Frankel, the deliciously droll Emily Blunt and the deadpan and fabulous Stanley Tucci, and you have the ingredients for what should be a pretty perfect follow-up to a smash hit.
Except sometimes the new film feels less like a sequel than a remake — something stitched together according to an old pattern. The finished outfit works, I suppose. But it’s in real need of a few accessories to jazz it up.
Instead, however, there are once again scenes of Andy working the phones trying to accomplish an impossible task, and of Miranda being absolutely impossible about it. There are don’t-blink cameos by couture legends and surprise celebrities, clothes-porn pans along racks of Chanel and Dior, and occasional, quotable putdowns.
Which aren’t the worst things to reprise; at least those tropes still work. What drags is when the film repeats things that didn’t hit the first time, like a by-the-numbers love affair for Andy (whose highpoints, and low points, are equally unmotivated). Or the predictable plot complication that has the clever Andy thinking she’s saving Miranda from disaster (when Miranda, also once again, has been way ahead of her all the time).
It’s fun, of course, to see this cast, and these characters, return to the screen. As Nigel, Miranda’s right-hand fashionista, Tucci remains worth his weight in Cartier, his every witticism sharpened to a glittering point. And Streep remains in formidable, icy control, managing to pack paragraphs of weary disappointment into the simple dismissal of “That’s all.”
And yet … should these characters be so immediately recognizable, 20 years later? Shouldn’t they have changed just a bit? No one — least of all Andy, who is now in her 40s — seems to have learned anything over the last two decades. They’re all acting exactly as they always have — until, in its last few, poorly motivated scenes, the movie has several of them suddenly act out of character, as it works hard to give us a case of the warm-and-fuzzies.
Anne Hathaway, Meryl Streep and Stanley Tucci in “The Devil Wears Prada 2.”
Well, I’m sorry, but no. It we wanted warm and fuzzy, we’d put on some angora. We want side eye. We want shade. We want more oh-no-she-didn’t zingers.
True, “The Devil Wears Prada 2” delivers some of that — and a few new things, too. Justin Theroux has several good scenes as a fatuous and of course extraordinarily rich tech bro (the only really fresh character in the film). The biggest celebrity cameo pays off nicely.
There are also some quick, scattered jokes about Miranda trying to cope with a grave new world of viral journalism and easily triggered employees. (Advised she can’t say a recent fashion spread of glum models looks like it was shot “in a methadone clinic in New Jersey,” she’s genuinely puzzled as to what gave offense. “New Jersey?” she finally asks.)
But there are too few moments like that, acknowledging that, yes, it has been 20 years since we last saw these characters. True, the film does admit that the world has changed (although having a Disney production tsk-tsk about heartless conglomerates is worth its own bitter Miranda quip). But we have all changed, too. Why haven’t Miranda, Andy and Nigel? Why do they look, and act, exactly the same?
The movie is like that safe, dark suit you always wear to every business dinner. Yes, it’s perfectly appropriate. No one will ever see it and think it’s awful. But is that really what you were going for? Is that really the best you can do? Is inoffensive predictability really the creative summit everyone here was reaching for?
That’s all.
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